Ninety-seven of the funds no longer exist as investors in 2000 knew them: Forty-four had their track records swept under the rug as the portfolios were merged into other funds. Twenty-two were liquidated, with what little money there was returned to investors. Morningstar was unable to determine the fate of another 31; they had dropped out of its database.

Of 179 survivors tracked by Morningstar, only 37 topped the broader market's modest average return of 1.7% a year in the seven years since March 10, 2000, while another half-dozen eked out slimmer positive results. For nearly a third of these funds, an investor who bought on the day the Nasdaq Composite Index peaked would have averaged double-digit annual losses since.

The lesson here is this: Ya know those little disclaimers at the bottom of all those ads for mutual funds in personal finance magazines? The ones where it says Past performance is not a guarantee of future results? That's not just boiler-plate legal mumbo-jumbo. It's really true. In fact, some studies indicate that poorly performing funds tend to outperform their better counterparts in later years. When evaluating mutual funds (if you must do that at all ... I strongly encourage mutual fund investors to stick with index funds), pay attention to three things in this order: the fund's expense ratio, the fund's investment philosophy, and the fund's performance -- but only if the same manager has been there for a long time, and only if a long-term track record is available. But as investors in Bill Miller's fund are finding out, even a long-term track record doesn't guarantee continued success.